Saturday, February 28, 2015

I constructed a little tea shop, where Marie can pick out the perfect sweets for her afternoon tea with the girls. Marie's so happy, she's strung up some little flags and made a banner. Maybe she'll hang it on the windows of the shop.

The shop is constructed from 2" paper maché boxes with lids. I used two boxes for the lower shelves, and a box lid for the upper window. The "curtains" are actually the skirt I cut off of a figure in the collage sheet. I attached it to a Panniers Dress shape cutout, and added the "Tea Party" heart and the clock. It was fun to adorn the shop with ball fringe and Dresden trim.

Here's a photo of the back of the shop, where you can see how the dress shape cutout was the perfect shape to support not only the curtains, but also the heart and clock, plus all the little leaves surrounding the clock. You can also see how the flag was attached. I used a bit of E6000 to adhere it up at the top, but because of the ball fringe, I could only attach it at that one spot. To make it stable, I glued a little pink bead to the flat surface of the box and stuck the end of the toothpick flagpole into that bead.

Look how adorable those little treats are! I gave all the paper treats some sparkly red Stickles accents, and glued
a small red seed bead onto the top of each of the cupcakes, which also happen to be beads. The seed beads make perfect little cherries, and fit
right into the holes in the cupcakes. I also glued a seed bead to the bottom of the heart shaped tart so it sits at an angle and can be seen more easily.

Here's the showpiece cake in the top window. It has lots of red Stickle cherries, and a little piece of lace serving as a doily. The little Tea Party heart was solid green, so I took a Sharpie marker to it and highlighted the raised areas in black.

What sweet little 3D bows! I used a silicone mold and some paper clay to create them. I painted them pink with little green polka dots, and gave them a coat of glaze to make them nice and shiny.

I was going to have the shop sitting right on the ground, but it really looked better taller, where Marie can reach it properly. My husband helped me cut a little piece of wood and some dowels for legs. I painted the top white (the pom pom trim will cover that) and the legs a nice blue green to match the Dresden trim and Tea Party heart.

One more photo of Marie, so happy with her polka dotted bunting. How does she stay so thin with all those tempting tarts and cupcakes so readily available?

Hope you can join Marie and me for tea! For a complete list of supplies, click here.

Wednesday, February 11, 2015

I was poking around on Etsy the yesterday and happened upon sweetbestiary,
a shop with the cutest little paperclay figurines. I fell in love with
the little figures with the animal suits on! There wasn't one with a
bunny suit on (my favorite!), so I decided to give it a whirl and make
one of my own. I ended up using Apoxie Sculpt for mine, but would
probably opt for paperclay if I decided to do another.

Here's my bunny boy, in his little blue polka dot rabbit outfit. Once he
was painted, I brushed a little ink on him to age him, and then covered
him with some glaze to make him shiny. He fits right in the palm of my hand.

His puffy blue tail. Obviously, sweetbestiary has me beat in sculpting technique, but I sort of like the wambliness here.

Wednesday, February 4, 2015

This month, everything at Alpha Stamps is cute as a button! I received collage sheets and buttons, and lots of kittens! I had a bunch of 2" wooden blocks, so I set out to make a set of three blocks that would (hopefully) look like they had been played with, and then I added a wire to hold some vintage photos.

To start the project, I painted each block and a wooden wheel a different color, chosen to coordinate with the Sew Lovely 6" paper pad. I sanded all the edges, inked them a bit, and then covered each side with a different paper, cut a little smaller than the side of the block. One side of the blocks got kittens and a couple of buttons, while the reverse side got some adorable children. After I adhered the images, I lightly sanded each one to distress the surface.

I made some good use of my Silhouette Cameo cutter for this project, cutting out the word cat...

...and the numbers 1, 2, and 3 to put on the sides of the blocks.

I also decorated a couple of spools with some of the kitty and heart buttons. That cat on the right cracks me up. He's so excited to be on that spool!

Sunday, February 1, 2015

Here's the second in my Tin of the Month Club series. In case you missed January, I found a great set of 12 tiny tins, and each month, I'll be altering one to celebrate that month.

Ah, February! Seems like a Valentine's theme is in order. For this tin, I used red glitter around some cute scrapbook paper with hearts. The words "kiss me" were cut out of an old dictionary, and the happy couple came from a collage sheet. I trimmed the outside with tiny red pom poms, and a heart and cupid charm, all found at Alpha Stamps. So romantic!